In the game of golf, a variety of hazards, such as sand traps (also commonly referred to as "bunkers"), tall grass, strategically placed trees and water hazards, are designed into golf courses to make the courses interesting by penalizing golfers who hit errant shots. Golf clubs such as sand and pitching wedges are often used to extricate a golf ball from a hazard by hitting the ball safely onto the green or into the fairway. Usually the golf ball must be hit in an upward direction to escape or avoid such hazards. Therefore, the club faces of traditional sand and pitching wedges are manufactured with large loft angles between the face and the shaft of the club. A large loft angle causes the golf ball to rise quickly from the point of contact with substantial back spin to reduce roll. This combined effect allows the golfer to hit the golf ball out of or over hazards without overrunning the green. For example, if the golf ball is laying next to the green in a sand trap with steep bunker walls, a sand wedge provides the golfer with enough shot versatility to avoid the bunker walls without hitting the golf ball so far that it either flies over the green or rolls off of it.
However, the golfer must still use the golf club correctly before he can celebrate a successful shot, and correct use is not easy. When the golf ball rests in short grass, the head of a golf club should strike the golf ball before striking the ground. Therefore, besides a very slight aerodynamic drag encountered by the golf club as it is swung through the air, virtually no resistance is present on the head of the golf club until contact is made with the golf ball. On the other hand, when the golf ball lies either in high grass or is partially (or totally) embedded in sand, mud or water, the head of the golf club must first come into contact with another medium (certain to be more viscous than air) prior to moving the golf ball. Thus, when a sand wedge is used, as in the previous example, to hit a golf ball out of a sand trap, a portion of the hosel and ball-striking club face becomes emersed in the sand.
When hitting a golf ball out of a sand trap, the golfer is supposed to establish a swing arc that causes the club head to strike the sand a certain distance behind the golf ball and go a certain depth into the sand. In this manner, the club face pushes the sand behind and underneath the golf ball, thereby lifting it from out of the bunker. The difficulty of the shot results from the additional resistance created as the golf club's hosel enters the sand along with the lower portion of the club face. Since the sand is more viscous than air, the extra drag placed on the club head by the hosel causes the horizontal placement of the center of drag of the club head to shift out of alignment with its center of percussion, which in turn results in a sideways twisting of the club face just before the ball is hit, thereby causing the deviation from the intended flight path known as a "hook".
Skillful golfers are aware of the twist effect, although not necessarily the cause of it, generated by the additional hosel drag. They compensate for the twisting moment either by swing, grip or aim adjustment to hit a golf ball out of a hazard, without the golf ball deviating substantially from its intended flight path. However, because the compensation varies with the swing speed, the depth the ball is in the hazard, and the viscous characteristic of the material in which the ball is embedded, doing so successfully and consistently is very difficult, and the average golfer either will not adjust swing, aim or grip to correct for the off-center drag caused by the hazard, or will not factor into the compensation equation intended swing speed and viscous characteristic. Thus, the blade of the club will inevitably twist (counter-clockwise for a right handed golfer) as it meets the off-center resistance, and the golf ball will travel in an unintended direction.
Therefore, there has been a need to provide a golf club which eliminates the need for the golfer to compensate for the additional hosel drag encountered in viscous mediums such as high grass and sand, and which can be used by ordinary golfers to increase their shot accuracy from difficult lies without requiring extraordinary golfing skill.